This us exactly what I have been saying for years. You make a successful movie then you turn around and make a sequel. While this was not feasible with Titanic, Avatar was a completely different situation. Cameron really blew the opportunity when he put the sequel on his back burner. His priorities, his choice. I think this decision will end up loosing more than 1.5B in potential income for the studio. I doubt very seriously if Water brings in even half the dollars that Avatar did.. At least Lucas was smart enough to release the first three SW movies fairly close to each other.. Plus Disney has probably recouped its SW investment by selling $200 plastic light sabers. Outside the Disney park, I doubt if there is much demand for Avatar merch? I think it would be lucky to break $1B. About $1.5B would be the end of the world!
Although... remember that experience that took 10 years of his life, gave him massive amounts of stress, turned his hair mostly gray, and cost him his marriage. I think the four Avatar sequels (Avatar 2, 3, 4, 5) together are said to cost $1 billion dollars, so call it roughly $250 million apiece. Add to that about $100M for prints and advertising... I think the breakeven point is $800 million worldwide gross. If they make under a billion, I think that'll be considered "somewhat" of a disappointment, but not a disaster.
It's not the first time he made those statements, it's a business after all and I think he's being a little bit coy to be honest. They already have the data, the trailer has 31 million views on the Avatar YouTube channel in 6 days, more than the final Black Panther trailer released a month ago. The re-release made $76.5 million, more than all of the other re-releases this year combined. The only thing that could sink this movie is horrid reviews and word of mouth. Avatar The Way of Water looks like a Cameron Greatest Hits package based on the teaser/trailer/pics & information released so far. Will it make $2.9 Billion? I don't think so, the exchange rates are really bad now compared to 2009-10 for the international market, I don't think ticket price inflation can make up the difference which is substantial. I think they would be reasonable happy with $1.5-2.0 Billion. I know that the movie theatre industry is starving for a mega title, they need it bad right now.
$500 million domestic on a 35/65 split with international would equal a worldwide gross of $1.428 Billion + China (if it gets a release there). I think the Top Gun M $$$ is the minimum target that will guarantee a green light to finish Avatar 4 and get started on 5.
Anyway you look at it, studios need product. If the movies break $1B total, which I think that they will, the rest of the movies will get made. As long as each movie shows a profit, the next movie will be made.
Avatar 3 is already done (currently in post production) & the first act of 4 is done. Cameron will know before the end of the year or very early in January which course of action they will take, green light 4&5 or wrap things up with 3.
I reckon if the 'Avatar' series keeps making lots of money we could end up with 'Avatar 76 - The Geriatric Years'. Director James Cameron, now 140 years old, swears this will be the last 'Avatar' film. He Swears It! (Or maybe he's LYING! Gawd No! Avatar 77 might be on the way!).
New interview with Cameron posted on GQ. A lot of great insights into his career and his thoughts about making movies and other stuff. The Return of James Cameron, Box Office King a few bits from the article Sometimes, Cameron seems like a man in search of a problem to solve, or a deadly experience to survive, but he is emphatic that there is a purpose to the challenges he takes on. “There’s plenty of dangerous things that I won’t go near because they’re dangerous, but they have a randomness factor to them,” Cameron said. “Whitewater rafting? F*** that.” Nothing would work the first time Cameron and the production tried it. Or the second. Or usually the third. One day in Wellington, New Zealand, where Cameron was finishing the film, he showed me a single effects shot, numbered 405. “That means there’s been 405 versions of this before it gets to me,” he said. Cameron has been working on the movie since 2013; it was due out years ago. In September, he still wasn’t done. The Way of Water was expensive to make—How expensive? “Very f******,” according to Cameron, who told me he’d informed the studio that the film represented “the worst business case in movie history.” In order to be profitable, he’d said, “you have to be the third or fourth highest-grossing film in history. That’s your threshold. That’s your break even.”
The final trailer airs tonight during half time on Monday Night Football (ESPN) - tickets are going on sale today/tomorrow.
For that much $ he could raise the Titanic, set it sailing loaded with celebs, and have it crash into another iceberg. Or even a bunch of Icebergs chasing it. Icebergs vs the Titanic! In 3 D! He could also hire a competent screenwriter. Or two.
If Disney really needs 2 billion to break even, this is far and away the most expensive movie ever made. Might be as high as $700-$800m.
Or they want to front load all of the R&D costs in one shot that's what I suspect, apparently there are hundreds of new patents tied to this project (Avatar/Alita Battle Angel), the $2B breakeven number that Cameron tossed out probably includes worldwide marketing, at least I hope it does. It's a huge gamble for sure.
I really doubt that is a number that has any meaning at all. After all these years, I don't think that the studio would have given the green light to the film, if that were the case. I think the more reasonable expectation would be around $13B, which is in line with the numbers that have been previously mentioned in this thread. I don't think, that after all the publicity and success of the re-release of Avatar, that they would spend stupid money in the marketing of # II? As you have mentioned and I had commented about in an earlier earlier thread, they used Alita as a test bed to develop new technologies that were intentioned for number II. This certainly cut down on Water's production costs.
The movie has been rated PG-13 - Sequences of strong violence and intense action, partial nudity and some strong language.
I'm hoping future sequels - or at least this one - delves more seriously into the actual state of the inhabiting of an avatar by a human. As our lead character has forsaken his own body...who is he, really...? Is he a Nn'vi? No. Is he a clone? Possibly, but then...what exactly is the relationship between the clone and the inhabitor controlling the clone? And of course, how do the Na'vi process the concept that another is living among them, acting as one of them, but is neither truly one of them, or one of the species he came from anymore. There is a lot of cerebral ground here you can't really dramatize well in "tribe council" scenes lit by a attractively-designed CGI fireflies. Is there a soul Is there deterioration of the quality of the once-human soul through the inhabiting of another body Are there yet-undefinable qualities of being human that are lost forever once it leaves one body and permanently resides in another Is there an equivalent to a "soul" in Na'vi culture Is their concept of it compatible to that in human culture, in terms of believing in it, recognizing it, and tolerating another species also having one Are there qualities to Na'vi physiology, spirituality and yet-unknowable conditions on this planet that make one incompatible with the other Believe it or not, I came to ponder esoteric questions like these today, while the earworm of "Star Trekkin'" by The Firm, played in my head...! "It's life Jim, but not as we know it; not as we know it; not as we know it..."
I'm really looking forward to this and have no interest in what anything cost. I thought the first movie was terrific and the Imax preview for this one was even better. I can't wait to see this, I hope it's very successful and I hope the rest of them get made. Bring it on, I'll let Hollywood worry about the money.
The return of Quaritch as a Recom see post #136 for a pic and the previous page for details on these re-incarnated soldiers might answer some your questions. Lots of interesting possibilities there when you think about them returning from the dead in a Na'vi body/Human mind hybrid, memories of your prior life experiences are intact however the company has given you a Na'vi body, not human. Stephen Lang did say that his character will have a very interesting arc, I don't expect those changes to occur until Avatar 3 or 4, I assume he's going to be in full revenge mode in WoW. I don't know how deep into the weeds Cameron can go with this although he touched on it with the first movie, Jake's human physical condition deteriorates and he begins to hate his human life, one of the deleted scenes describes how he wants to become one of them while Grace has to remind him that it takes millions of dollars worth of tech for Avatars to even work. The Project 880 script also talks about Avatar drivers going insane from the long-term experience. The three laws of Eywa (this is cannon). You shall not set stone upon stone. Neither shall you use the turning wheel. Nor use the metals of the ground How did these laws come to be? Were the Na'vi once an advanced society who turned back to being hunter/gatherers? Who knows where Cameron is going with all of this, he did say that it won't be predictable and that no character is safe.
At minimum we're getting 2 and 3. Box office performance will determine if they finish 4 and start production on 5.
